In manufacturing processes employing photolithography or similar methods, substrates (e.g., wafers) can vary in size, for example, from 25 mm to 300 mm in diameter. The microscopic components that are manufactured on a substrate can likewise vary in size from a few hundred microns or smaller, to a few centimeters, and a single substrate can have dozens, hundreds or thousands of components. These components can include, for example, transistors, resistors, capacitors, integrated circuits, microchips, diamonds, etc. After a substrate is processed, the substrate is diced to separate the components from the substrate. The diced components are typically mounted as part of a component holder, as shown, for example in FIG. 1 and designated by the numeral 10. Component holder 10 includes components 12 on an adhesive support 14 surrounded by a thin frame 16. A hexagonal frame is shown, but differently shaped component holders can be used, and other means to hold the components to the holder can be employed (e.g., vacuum).
Following dicing, the components on component holder 10 can be inspected by an inspection system to identify components that deviate from the expected design beyond a certain tolerance, or components that fail an inspection metric defined by an operator. Components can also be inspected for other purposes, for example, to identify components that meet certain physical criteria (e.g., color, size, weight), performance criteria (electrical conductivity, resistivity, tensile strength or compressive strength) or any other criteria defined by an operator.
Once the components have been identified by the inspection system, it is necessary to physically locate those components on the component holder, using location or other identifying information, and to separate them out for removal, packaging and/or further processing.
While there exists ink dot mechanisms and pick and place equipment for locating the identified components on component holder 10, this equipment can be very expensive to purchase and operate. Therefore, many manufacturers choose not to invest in such equipment and instead employ human operators to manually sort identified components. However, because of the size of the components it can be challenging to find the locations of the physical components on the component holder.
Accordingly, there is a need in the art for new apparatus and methods for facilitating manual sorting of components on a component holder.